Q. 2 Discuss the future of Educational leadership from a global perspective in detail.
Course: School Leadership
Course Code 8618
Topics
- Educational Leadership
- Educational Leadership in Global Perspective
- Educational Leadership in Global Perspective
Answer:
Only one leadership style actually derived from education; Instructional leadership. It was organic in that researchers wanted to find out how certain urban (often low-economic, high-minority) schools were having success. They went in and “identified” the traits of the leaders, and coined it “instructional leadership” (it should be noted that much of the research isolated the informational traits exhibited by the leaders). This was in the mid-1960s. Before this, extensive research had not been done on actual educational leadership. The instructional leadership model dominated for at least 15 years. Then came the massive shift transformational.
Transnational, transnational,
servant, shared and all other leadership styles derived from research conducted
in the corporate worlds. The various successes demonstrated by the extensive research
made each style a target for possible implementation in the educational
field. However, after 30 years of attempting to finance research,
training, and implementation a shift BACK to instructional leadership was
championed, along with multiple variations and hybrids.
Today, the “trend” is shared/instructional leadership.
The bottom line is, that educational
leadership, like education itself, is contextual. What works perfectly in one
school, May not in another. However, research suggests that when an educational
leader possesses informational and instructional leadership skills (really
they are damn near synonymous; Transnational is “what the leader does” and
Instructional is “how they do it) school environments improve, teachers feel
empowered and student success is increased.
Sadly, there continues to be debate
about which leadership style is best (even with almost 6 decades of research
available). So because of this debate educational leadership programs flip-flop
with preparatory curriculums, districts shift with the latest “fad” and schools
suffer. But hopefully more people such as you will continue to inquire, probe,
interpret data, and shed further light on the topic.
It is no news that leadership as a
word can be very and as a matter of fact extremely difficult to define.
Therefore rather than giving it a direct and most likely unfounded definition,
it would be much better to gain an understanding of what exactly it entails by
deriving a conclusion after putting into consideration several profound
definitions.
Wikipedia describes “Leadership as the
process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support
of others in the accomplishment of a common task”. It goes further to give the
description of Alan Keith, who thinks “leadership is ultimately about creating
a way for people to contribute to making something extraordinary happen”. A
third and even simpler definition describes leadership as influencing a group
of people to achieve a common goal.
From these three definitions of
leadership, it is therefore fair to conclude or sum up that Leadership firstly
is a word that cannot be meaningful in isolation and it’s difficult to explain
the meaning without followership. Thus in summarizing the need for social
influence, support, and achieving a common goal, Leadership for this particular
paperwork can therefore be described as the “process” with which a Leader(an
Individual or team) sets out to achieve the common goal of a set of people by
the use of social influence.
In an attempt to gain a clearer image
of what truly leadership encompasses, one can take to mind very simple and
common-life examples of how very little things act as leaders. The door to a
house for example is the one legitimate way through which the beauties and
qualities of a house’s interior can be explored. In the same light, a leader is
a way through which the hidden qualities and beauties of a given set of
people determined to achieve a common goal can be explored. This house might be
a one-bedroom apartment, probably a 7 bedroom mansion, or even a 15-bedroom palace,
whichever or whatever it is, it’s out rightly uneatable that without a way (the
door) inside, no one can get to see what treasures this household. This is the
very same reason why doors exist right from the paper plan of the house. Yet
again, so also does a leader serve as the entrance and the medium that guides
his followers to achieve their common goal?
With the use of such a simple and
direct illustration of Leadership as being the “WAY”, one can easily misconnect
leadership to very simple, direct, and straight to the point. But in real case scenario,
it can prove to be slightly more complicated than the door that opens the way
to beautiful treasures. When for example one takes a look at Primary
educational institutions, a primary school to be precise, one can experience
and gain an even better understanding of how the process of leadership actually
unfolds. The principal or the school director is seen as a leader of this
particular institution.
Coupled with this overall leader are the sub-leaders, which comprise the Vice Principal or Deputy Director, the Head of
departments, the Class Teachers the Subject Teachers, and even the Class heads,
Class monitors, or Class prefects as the case may be, all of which are leaders
in their own jurisdiction. While being leaders, in so many different ways,
these authorities also happen to be learning. As messages and instructions are
passed on from the director to his Vice, a lesson or two is also taken on how
to ensure efficiency is paramount. Ultimately, we can derive that the efforts
and level of organization of all these leaders play a very important role in
seeing to it that learning as a process takes place, this learning can be
either direct or indirect. In an organization such as a primary school, there
is a serious and desperate need for efficiency in all endeavors and changes
need to occur for progress to be made.
Changes such as the development of the
teaching skills available, the receptiveness of the students, and even more importantly
the medium and system of communication that exists between both the teachers
and the learner. For example, a class of ten students would have an entirely
different style of communication compared to a class of 45 students if any form
of efficiency and productivity must be resultant from these students. A leader
in such a scenario must thus be capable enough to Direct both teacher and
student into a state of mind that encourages easy and productive communication.
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